Lesotho& Drakensberg

Lesotho, the land of no fences. A land where you can walk freely. A land where artfully constructed stone huts cling to unlikely places and jangling cowbells and the reedy voices of goats harders are the sounds of everyday life. Here a woman may walk for a day just to buy a packet of tea, but at the end of it her lined face will still have time for a broad smile and warm hello (coast to coast).

Driving through Lesotho, a little independent country in the south-east of South Africa, was an experience itself! Everyone was astonished we managed to get through the roads with a 2x2 car, not getting a flat tire with all the potholes :)! We stayed in the Malealea Lodge the first night, a very open and friendly place full of warm-hearted people. They have little huts where you can stay over and as swiss and weather-proof kids we thought we could manage with just our sleeping bags, ha! I guess we did underestimate how cold Lesotho can get! I was freezing all night even though wearing lots of clothes and trying to snuggle up to keep warm! But hey, we survived :).

The next morning we went on a pony trek to a viewpoint which was a really fun experience. We got to talk to our guide which was the same age as us and told us more about life in Lesotho. For example that like in many other cultures in SA the guy has to pay the girl's parents cows or horses if he wants to marry her. And if the girl doesn't want to get married to you, just give her parents one extra cow and it's ok :).

On our way through Lesotho we definitely got a lot of attention from the locals being one of the few tourists travelling there in this time of the year. Like from the policemen that stopped us about 5 times in two days just to have a chat with us, ask us why we are not married and why we are travelling by ourselves. One particular stop was quite amusing. There was a police block and we should've stopped at the stop sign and waited for the policemen to wave us on. But as we didn't know and just followed the front car they stopped us and told us it was an offense in Lesotho not to stop at the stop sign and they would want to take us to court. We just smiled at them and had a bit of a laugh. Different police officers kept approaching our car asking us all kind of funny questions and in the end one girl came to inform us that they just wanted to be friends with us and visit us in SA and get our numbers. We refused politely and continued our drive....:). The second night we stayed over in a farmers training center. As it was already getting dark there weren't many people around and not really an office to sign in. So this one guy phoned around and we had to drive to the next village to get the lady with the keys for the guest house. Astonishingly we got our own house, a comfy bed with lots of blankets and not surprisingly no electricity. So we lit some candles and made food and had quite a good time. There was no hot water also and only a bath and no shower. In the morning we thought we would give ourselves and experience of the good old days, heating up some water in a pan and taking it to the bath to take a ‘shower’. Quite amusing and actually not that bad :). On our way through the country we also managed to give quite some people a lift, like these guys that had to walk for two hours just to get some milk!

We gave them a lift on the way back and they were very thankful. If every kid in Europe would learn to appreciate transport a bit more and maybe having to walk every now and again….!!! I can’t believe how lazy our modern community has gotten.

On to Drakensberge in KwaZulu-Natal province. The Drakensberg mountains of South Africa or uKhahlamba (the Barrier of Spears) is a 200-kilometre-long mountainous wonderland and world heritage site. The Zulu people named it 'Ukhahlamba' 'The Dragon Mountain'. The Drakensberg Mountains tower over the area and form a gigantic barrier separating KwaZulu-Natal from the Kingdom of Lesotho. The only road access to Drakensberg is via Sani Pass that boasts the highest pub on Africa, 3000m above sea level. This is really the place to nurture your soul, a place with endless hikes around the mountains where you can see all kinds of vegetation and plants. In the southern part we stayed in the Sani Pass Backpackers and went for a hike around the mountains in the Drakensberg National Park.

At some point this area feels like Switzerland, which may also be the reason why there is a place called Little Switzerland :).

Further on we stayed close to the Amphitheater, a towering arc of crescent-shaped cliffs.

Our drive back home was through the lovely Free State which is a province in SA full of nothing. It’s predominantly farmland but also has some gold mines. Basically miles and miles of potholes, stop and go signs and endless roads! And a place called Bethlehem :)

And here we are pack in Potch again, a week of classes left although most of them get skipped without us knowing beforehand! Time is running out, soon it’s travelling again and back home to sweet Switzerland.